He Chose the Girl Who Tried to Kill Him novel · Chapter 15 of 24

Chapter 15: The Board Meets at Ten

The board room of the Severance Bank had a marble fireplace and a table long enough to land a boat on.

Eight directors sat along it, in black coats, with their hands folded.

My father sat at the head.

He rose when I came in, and kissed my cheek in front of all of them.

"My daughter," he said. "She has been unwell, gentlemen. You will forgive her."

I said nothing.

I looked at the far end of the room, where the doctor stood by the door with his bag and two big men in dark overcoats.

Tobias had walked me to the corner of Prospect Street.

He had told me about Langston's bargain, and I had told him no.

He had held my gloved hand for as long as the lamp stayed red, and then he had let go and I had gone in alone.

Langston was at my father's right hand.

He did not look at me.

He sat with his hands flat on the green leather and his face the color of candle wax.

A paper lay before my empty chair, with a gold pen beside it.

"The Haldane settlement," my father said. "Sign at the foot, Adaline. Then the doctor will see you home and we can all go to lunch."

I picked up the pen.

Then I set it down again.

"I'd like to read something first," I said.

"This is not the place."

"It's the very place."

I took the blue sheet out of my glove.

I had brought only the second page, folded small.

"Gentlemen, this is a letter from a girl named Lottie Fenner," I said. "She was a housemaid in my father's house. She died two years ago on Case Avenue."

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